“Then we take her home and show her that one man isn’t as good as another.” Because that’s what it was really all about. Not that Adam was all that eager to let another man touch what was his, but it would be the ultimate show of trust, of love.
“Why can’t we just be thankful that we steered her clear of the sheriff and that stupid prostitution thing? Then instead of focusing on how to ruin our good thing, we can try convincing her to stay at home when we have night patrol?”
“Then we can paint her a nice white picket fence and get her a little purse dog to carry around.” Adam rolled his eyes. “You’re the one that’s going to ruin everything if you keep trying to make Rachel into something she’s not.”
“Me?” Killian growled. “I’m not the one who took a sweet, wholesome lady and turned her into an insatiable sex kitten.”
Killian could cry on all he wanted. Adam knew he appreciated Rachel’s more than healthy appetites. Adam would have loved to get a comeback in on that one, but the radio started squawking and their quiet Thursday began to show a little life.
* * * *
Nobody ever listened to him. Killian knew they all thought he was just some big, dumb redneck. So they dismissed his worries as extreme and laughed at him. Well, Adam wasn’t laughing now. Hell, nobody was, except for Kyle Harding who danced around Killian like a puppy ready for action.
“Just tell her I’m too drunk to drive myself home.” Kyle’s eyebrows wiggled as he nodded enthusiastically over his own suggestion.
Killian ignored him, preferring to glare through the sea of flashing lights to where Rachel sat on the tail of the fire department’s medical response truck. With half her jaw already swollen, she wasn’t even able to smile without pain right now. Of course, if she’d listened to him, she’d be home, safe and sound, instead of having to answer whatever questions Brandon pestered her with.
That’s where I told her to stay. He’d been an idiot to assume she’d listen to him, but he had told her anyway. Killian figured she’d been listening to everything these past couple of weeks. Why, though, went beyond him right then. Rachel had already been caught once keeping secrets. Now he had to wonder if she didn’t have a few more tucked away.
“Come on, man, just do me this one favor.” Kyle Harding’s stupid face blocked out the sight of Mickey tending to Rachel and forced Killian to crane his neck to get the view back. “I promise you do this for me and I’ll owe you whatever you name.”
Killian growled, casting Kyle a dirty look for bothering him with his nonsense. Nothing but an eager smile and a pathetically hopeful gleam in his gaze. There would be no getting rid of him. At least not quick enough for Killian’s patience.
“See, if you just do me—Hey, now!” Kyle hollered when Killian suddenly latched on to his elbow. “Watch it, buddy!”
Killian didn’t know if it was a part of Kyle’s act or if he was lodging a sincere complaint. He didn’t care, either. Dragging Kyle behind him, Killian used his considerable bulk and foul disposition to send both Mickey and Brandon scattering. He wanted to have a private word with Rachel and even Hailey Mathews with her stubborn chin turned up at him wouldn’t be getting in his way.
Killian thrust Kyle at her, not about to be intimidated by the tiny redheaded spitfire. “I think this belongs to you.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t be doing too much thinking.”
Killian almost didn’t catch her sour mutter as Kyle talked right over, playing up the drunk thing with a wobble and a wide grin. “Hey, Hailey. You see me whoop that guy?”
“Yeah, I saw you step in unwanted and make an ass of yourself. What of it?”
Tuning out the couple as they bickered, Killian caught Rachel’s eye. No upturned chin from her. With a bow of her head, she tried to appear submissive, but it was a lie.
“Touch me again and I’ll whoop you myself right here, boy.” Hailey’s bark masked a retreat that only had Kyle stumbling after her.
At least I’m not trying to tame the feral. That cold comfort brought the first smirk to his features since arriving to find Rachel trapped in the middle of a bar fight. Whatever Kyle’s game was, he obviously did need some help. Hell, if Kyle managed to leash Hailey, Rachel would be down one partner in crime.
“Well, don’t hit him here,” Killian finally spoke up, interrupting the couple as Hailey fought to keep Kyle’s arm from her shoulder. “Then I’d have to arrest you for assault, so why don’t you take him home and beat him in the privacy of his own house?”
“You heard the deputy, dumbass. Get. Lost.”
Kyle’s nose dipped until it bumped into Hailey’s before he responded to her last two shouted words with his own smug ones. “Can’t. Drive.”
“Then walk.”
“I could wander into the street and get hit by a car.”
“I’d suggest you avoid the street then.”
“Come on, Hailey.” Killian lent the authority of his position to Kyle’s cause. “I can’t let a drunk wander off, and I can’t let him drive. I’d appreciate if you drove him home. Otherwise, I’ll have to drive him to the station.”
“Yeah, Hailey, you don’t want to piss off the already pissed off deputy.”
It had only taken Kyle a second to make Killian regret even dragging him over in the first place. Of course, Hailey did a good job of annoying him with all her questions.
“If you can drive him to the station, why can’t you drive him home?”
“Not allowed to have civilian passengers in the cruiser because of liability reasons. He gets in the car. He goes to the station.” Killian paused, casting a look at the top of Rachel’s head since she refused to look up and meet his gaze. “Besides, I have other things that need to be attended to.”
That had Rachel’s chin snapping up, showing off not only her narrowing gaze but her swollen cheek. “You better not be referring to me as a thing.”
“I’m sure he was referring to the men we’re hauling down to the station,” Alex cut in smoothly.
The sheriff’s sudden help didn’t come across as sincere to Killian. Instead, his arrival only prickled Killian’s nerves. Not that he could do a thing about it. The sheriff-deputy thing really got in the way. The rotten bastard used that to his advantage, stepping right in between Rachel and him.
“I’m going to need you to come down to the station to give a statement and swear out a warrant.”
Before Killian could assure the sheriff he’d handle Rachel, Hailey perked up, all too eager to help. “I’ll give a statement.”
“You,” Alex said, turning a scowl loose on the couple in front of him, “get that drunk ass out of here before I change my mind and have Killian haul him down to the station, too.”
God, but the woman was beyond stubborn and ballsy, too. Instead of giving in to the inevitable, she just stood there glaring at the sheriff, silently refusing to obey that order. Killian was pretty sure Alex wouldn’t be getting Hailey’s vote in the next election.
“Come on, Hailey.” Killian tried to coax her with a sincere tone. “He really did fail his sobriety test. We can’t just let him go without knowing somebody is looking after him.”
“Fine. I’ll look after the sorry bastard.” Hailey looked ready to bite Kyle as she held her hand out. “Give me your damn keys.”
Kyle grinned, throwing his arm over her shoulders and using his weight to steer her away, no doubt before she changed her mind. She might if the boy didn’t take it easy.
“They’re right here in my pocket, darlin’. Wanna fish them out for me?”
Killian watched the couple go after each other as they headed toward Kyle’s truck. It didn’t take much intuition to figure out how their night would end. The only thing he couldn’t figure out was where the hell Cole was.
Not that Killian really cared about the answer. He had his own, much bigger, problems to deal with—like getting rid of the sheriff. Alex met his gaze, and Killian could almost read the thoughts in the other man’s mind. He wanted Killian gone.
<
br /> “I think maybe it’s best if you clock out for the night.”
Son of a bitch. Killian wouldn’t be taken out that easily. “And I think maybe I should be taking care of Rachel’s statement, given that she is my girlfriend.”
The corner of Alex’s lip curled upward in such a smug twist Killian knew he’d stepped into some trap. The problem was he didn’t know what he’d just done. Not that Alex would explain it. Rachel might if the way her look darkened was any indication.
“That’s just why I need you to clock out. I can’t have those boys’ lawyer arguing anything improper happened, which he will the moment he finds out the responding officer’s girlfriend was injured in the fight.”
The cocky bastard had reason on his side. Not to mention the authority of his position. “Fine. I’m sure, though, that the lawyer couldn’t complain that I was with her as her off-duty boyfriend.”
“You and Adam?” Alex shook his head. “I’d hate to see some slimeball decide to try and convince a judge that Rachel likes to manipulate men into fighting over her, and you know how some defense lawyers love to rip into innocent victims.”
“Oh, please,” Rachel muttered. “Like this is even going to go to trial. Now the two of you stop it.”
Killian didn’t like the way she so easily dismissed the importance of this case, much less the way she spoke to them like they were children. He wasn’t the idiot who had gotten himself into a bar fight. “Stop what? Stop caring that an innocent woman was injured in a fit of violence by a bunch of hot-heads trying to prove something?”
“I’m not really injured, Killian.” There came that tone again, annoyed and condescending all at once. “The guy’s fist barely glanced off me. Nothing is even broken.”
Her complete dismissal of the danger made every one of Killian’s muscles clench with frustration. “Well, it could have been. It could have been a hell of a lot worse than broken. You could have died. He could have hit you and you could have fallen over, cracked your head on the table or the floor, and died right there!”
Rachel snorted, not even bothering to respond to him.
“These things happen,” Killian found himself insisting. “Tell her, Alex.”
“They do, sometimes.” Alex shrugged before proving why Killian really was the idiot in the group to ask for his help. “But obviously not tonight, and I think you’ve proven just why you need to go home and cool off. I can’t have you near those boys in the state you’re in.”
Killian couldn’t hit the sheriff, at least not here and now in front of Rachel. He certainly couldn’t put her over his knee and paddle her as he itched to. All he could do was simmer and brood and wait until he had Rachel all to himself, alone in the privacy of their bedroom.
“Fine,” Killian ground the word out despite how much it hurt him, “I guess I’ll see you at home, then.”
Turning, he didn’t once look back as he stormed off toward his cruiser. He’d have made it there incident free if Adam hadn’t come jogging out of the bar and into his path. Now there was somebody he could hit.
“Hey, man, where you headed?”
Killian flattened him with one good punch and kept on walking.
Chapter 27
“I cannot believe she got into a bar fight. A bar fight.”
Adam held the ice pack to his jaw and sighed back into the couch. What a long night it had been for so few hours to have passed. Real time didn’t matter to his body. He was sore and tired and kind of cranky, given he’d been punched for no good reason.
“Did you see her cheek? It was all swollen and bruised. She could have broken her jaw, if not her damn head.”
He could have, too, though Adam didn’t think Killian would care much right then if he’d died. Adam could forgive Killian for his insensitivity, even his violent reaction. It wasn’t like he approved of the girl getting herself hit or cared to sit around while the sheriff played hero to his lady. Still, Adam figured his night would be going about fifty percent better if Killian would just stop yelling at him.
“This is all your fault.”
Adam didn’t know how Killian had come to that conclusion. He hadn’t gone all bossy on the girl. Nor had Adam lied about anything. As far as he could tell, this nightmare had resulted from both Rachel and Killian’s inability to communicate.
“What’s next? What?”
Adam didn’t know, but he suspected it wouldn’t be good. Even if Rachel shared some of the blame for this disaster of a night, now would probably not be a good time to go all commando on the girl. Tomorrow would be soon enough to get the ropes out and get down to another confession. That is, if Killian could wait.
Adam bet he couldn’t. Instead, he had a feeling that Rachel would come in that door about as sore and annoyed as Adam felt right then. With Killian’s temper greeting her at the first step it would probably be like a spark to a powder keg.
“Well, I’m not going to wait to find out. No, sir. I’m going to paddle that ass so hard she wouldn’t be able to leave this house for a week.”
Killian was all blustered. Adam knew for certain that Killian wouldn’t hit Rachel.
“Fuck that, it will take a whole month to talk some sense into that woman—”
No matter what he said.
“—not that the woman has much of that to start with. She should be damn happy to have us taking care of her. She should be home at night waiting on us, making our house right and our lives easier. Not out there, tearing up the town like some wanna-be teenager chasing after every stupid-ass idea that pops into her empty little head.”
Of course, Rachel might hit Killian. Adam knew Killian didn’t mean what he said, but he also knew Rachel wouldn’t care. Some things couldn’t be taken back and others could never be forgiven. Maybe it was actually time to try and cool Killian down because Rachel would be home soon.
“And to go off with the sheriff? The sheriff? That punk’s making his move right now, acting all calm and reasonable, trying to make me look all insane and jealous. Like I would be.”
“No, of course not. You’re acting in a completely calm, reasonable, and sane fashion right now.”
Adam lowered the icepack from his throbbing jaw to meet Killian’s dark glare with his own pointed look. The staring match lasted a good minute and kept Killian grounded for all sixty seconds before he muttered an obscenity and turned back to his pacing. This time he kept his bitching under his breath, but Adam still caught pieces.
“…idiot started this in the first place…” Killian curved around the edge of the sofa, his voice fading out until he’d passed her desk and came back around the edge. “…my good girl and turned her into…”
Killian’s good girl had returned, judging from the headlights flashing through the room. They must have sliced right through Killian’s skin because the big man jumped. With the smooth, gracefulness of an ox, Killian managed to knock over a whole stack of papers piled on the side of her desk with his hurried motions.
“Way to go, slick.”Adam chunked the ice pack onto the coffee table and pushed off to his feet.
Things would be bad enough once Rachel got a whiff of Killian’s foul mood. They didn’t need to be made worse by throwing her things all about or snooping through them. Adam intentionally bumped Killian, who had bent down to pick up the papers but gotten sidelined reading them.
Shuffling the rest on the floor, Adam felt compelled to pull on the stack Killian had curling in his fists when a car door slammed. “Come on, man, we got like—”
“What the hell is this?”
* * * *
Rachel stalled at the door, staring at it as dread mounted in her stomach. The sick sensation tightened, making it all the harder to reach out and turn the knob. Killian and Adam waited on the other side, and it didn’t take a genius to guess what their moods would be.
Or where she’d be heading the moment she walked through the door—back to the bedroom. This time they’d probably be particularly brutal, especially Killian.
Rachel had seen the darkness in his eyes, but the redness in his ears was what really worried her. When he got flushed, she knew somebody had really managed to piss him off.
Before tonight that somebody had never actually been her. Even on her birthday, Adam had played the heavy, and Killian had said she’d made him weak. Well, she’d probably return that favor tonight. Only, she was already feeling weak. Weak, tired, sore, and worse, guilty, Rachel didn’t have a single bit of happiness to cling to right then.
It didn’t matter that she hadn’t technically lied to them about staying in tonight or that she was old enough to do as she pleased. Staring at the door, Rachel felt the dread of a teenager coming home to face an irate parent. Except that she was a woman returning to her lovers.
They weren’t supposed to behave like fathers. That really irritated her, helping her to take one step forward and reach for the doorknob. Inhaling a deep breath, she twisted and pushed. She expected a full-on blasting the second the door creaked all the way open. What she hadn’t expected was to be the one doing it.
“What the hell is this?” Rachel couldn’t believe what her eyes showed. With Killian and Adam on their knees with her papers splayed out between them, it looked an awful lot like she’d caught them snooping.
At least Adam had the decency to act startled and try to defend himself. Shooting to his feet, he dropped the papers he’d been holding. They cascaded into a fine mess even as he tried to explain.
“It isn’t what it—”
“I want to know what the hell you think you’re doing.” Adam couldn’t speak fast enough to soothe her temper. Nor was he the one who she really wanted to talk to. Killian dominated her attention as he rose up, the papers clutched in his white-knuckled fists trembling. Pissed didn’t even begin to describe his expression, but Rachel didn’t care. She’d had enough.
Flinging her purse over the couch, she met him as he shoved Adam out of the way.
“I could ask you the same question. What are these?” Killian rattled the papers right in Rachel’s face, causing her to snatch them out of his hands.
Penn, Jenny - Rachel's Seduction [Cattleman's Club] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 28